A Study Of Application Of Discourse Theory To The Discourse-based Rational Cloze Test Teaching In Senior High School

Discourse-based rational cloze test, a new test type in National Matriculation English Test(NMET), is considered to be an effective and economic method of measuring the students’ general language proficiency together with the ability in reading comprehension. This test type is receiving more and more attention from not only the students but also the teachers. However, according to the questionnaires and the tests which the author carries out, it can be seen the students’ performance is poor and most of the teachers’ teaching method is very traditional in the discourse-based rational cloze test. Thus, to improve the current situation is necessary and urgent. This paper applies the discourse and discourse function theory into the teaching of this test type, aiming to better not only the students’ performance but also the teachers’ teaching theory.There are two questionnaires, two test papers and several interviews with the English teachers, with one hundred students and fifteen English teachers taking part in. The data collected from the three instruments are analyzed through T-test by SPSS 22.0.According to the analysis and discussion of the data, the findings can be drawn as follows: the students’ ability to deal with the discourse-based rational cloze can be enhanced and the teachers’ teaching theory can be enriched with the application of the discourse and discourse function into the teaching of the discourse-based rational cloze test, especially after the students mastering the knowledge of thematic structure, information structure, cohesion, coherence, context, discourse types and discourse patterns and their grades on the discourse-based rational cloze test are improved a lot. Thus, it is necessary and feasible to apply the discourse and discourse function theory into the teaching of this test type in high school. The author of this paper hopes that the application of discourse and discourse function theory to discourse-based rational cloze in senior high school can make some pedagogical implications to their English teaching, particularly improve the students’ ability of applying discourse and discourse function in their English studying, not only limited in this test type but also the other test forms.